Totila punished the wealthy and powerful who had traded with Bessas by giving his men a free hand to plunder their villas and warehouses, but he showed a better appreciation of his priorities by feeding the needy citizens. The Goths were afforded another advantage: Rome fell to Totila in December and he would thus winter within its walls and not in the camps surrounding the city, rapidly becoming fetid. His next act was to despatch a body of Roman divines to offer Justinian peace.
Bessas, at present nowhere to be seen, was not the only insubordinate inferior Flavius had to deal with. All his attempts to oblige John Vitalianus to march north and combine with him failed. John could claim that he faced his own threats – Totila had sent a token force south to contain him – but it was insufficient in number to justify the excuse.
Now holding the capital, Totila could release more men to take back control of the fertile south of the peninsula. That they failed brought on an unexpected response: he decided to raze the walls of Rome and render it indefensible. In addition he set out a plan to fire all the important buildings, including structures that dated from the time of Augustus Caesar, an act that would diminish Rome’s importance.
The desperate appeal from Flavius Belisarius to desist bore fruit; the sender pleaded for preservation of ancient glories and also pointed out that Totila, holding the city, would be fouling the value of his own possessions. Added to that Justinian would be unlikely to grant peace to such a despoiler. The Goth relented but with a good third of the defences torn down he felt he could leave Rome without even a token garrison for, even if the Byzantines retook the city, they would be unable to hold it.
Sending a strong force south to contest Apulia, Calabria and Lucania with John Vitalianus, and that included many senatorial hostages from Rome, he left a robust force camped at Tibur five leagues to the east of the city – a day’s forced march – this to deter the Byzantines holding Portus, while personally retiring on Ravenna.
Betrayal was not confined to the likes of Bessas; the loyalties of the Italian Peninsula had become so fractured that treachery had become a commonplace and Totila was as subject to that as Flavius. Spoletum and Perusia were brought back to Byzantium by treachery but it was really the capital city that mattered, both for its size and emotional appeal.
Sure Totila was gone, Flavius set forth at the head of a much diminished comitatus, men he had recruited on his being given the Italian command and now numbering no more than a thousand effectives, to reconnoitre what had been left behind. Betrayed by an informer they rode straight into an ambush by the Tibur Goths, who had marched from the east to confront him. The Byzantines were outnumbered and it was only the generalship of Flavius added to the discipline of his personal troops that saved what should have been a rout.
The Goths attacked expecting panic but as had happened before they found their enemies quick to form up for battle, with a speed that reversed the prospects of an easy victory. Flavius led his fighters into the melee with no care for his person, slashing to left and right at mounted opponents and ignoring the blows that got past his shield and were landed on his armour. As had also happened in previous engagements, he needed to be rescued by his bodyguards but not before he was the victim of several minor wounds.
The Goths lost more than Flavius, yet he was forced to retire to Portus once more, to bathe and have such gashes and abrasions treated, to be made aware – and not for the first time, as he examined old scars and recalled other areas of his body rendered black and blue by combat – of how lucky he had been in so many years of battle to still be whole.
‘You are a fool to risk yourself. You’re a general, you should behave like one.’
This was the constant lament from Antonina, who could not be barred from observance of his latest lacerations and bruises. It would have seemed like sympathy if he had not wondered, instead, if her concern was prompted by fear for her own needs should he expire. Only Flavius alive made her of use to Theodora.
Justinian responded to the peace offer from Totila by advising the Goth to treat with his representative in Italy. Flavius knew as much as the Goth that he was in receipt of a refusal. The war had to go on, but with little faith from the general in command that he could repeat his previous success; he had neither the men to do so nor, in the likes of Bessas and John Vitalianus, inferior commanders who would unquestioningly obey his orders, the former because of his greed, John through the connection he had to Theodora through his marriage.
Not a man to rest, even with odds so heavily stacked against him, and sure he had both luck and God with him, Flavius left Portus with nothing but token protection and marched with all the men he could muster on Rome, which he entered into unopposed to find much destruction. Time was not on his side and he needed new gates made, added to which there was a huge stretch of wall to be repaired.
Bluff was needed; ramparts were erected that would not withstand much in the way of assault or mining but he made sure that was hidden on the outer face by adding a smooth coating of lime. Employing the ditch he had dug prior to the previous siege Flavius had stakes placed in the base to make it more of an obstacle. Most important of all were the supplies he brought in to the city, which could not rely as it usually did on the ravaged countryside that surrounded it.
Totila did not make it to Ravenna; the news of the Belisarius move obliged him to reverse his course and make for Rome, where he expected a quick return to the status in which he had left it. Yet the Goth army moved at no great pace, giving Flavius over three weeks to effect repairs, so what the enemy was faced with, a lack of gates notwithstanding, looked formidable; it was not, but show was as good as strength when that was the only choice.
Totila did not hesitate to attack, he threw his men forward with no preparation at the open spaces where the gates once stood, these now filled with the best troops Flavius could deploy. They held because the Goths, in such a constrained killing zone, could not deploy sufficient numbers to overpower the defence and, pressing forward, they were at the mercy of murderous archery and rocks thrown from the parapets to either side.
Exhaustion and the approach of nightfall brought the fighting to an end but it was renewed at first light, only this time Flavius had decided not to stay on the defensive and that threw the Goths into such confusion that, when assaulted, they fell back. The danger for Flavius now was a too eager pursuit and it was only by riding out at the head of his fastest cavalry that he could get ahead of his own fighting men and, having ordered a withdrawal, could cover their retreat.
On the third day he again varied his tactics, leading his whole force out of Rome to confront Totila on open ground. That it was luck that carried the day rather than better soldiering was later accepted. The man bearing the standard of his king fell and the banner with him, which indicated to the Goths their leader had perished and that caused a degree of panic. In some disarray they did recover the standard but the heart had gone from their purpose and, since he held the ground, Flavius could claim to have been victorious.
Whatever decided Totila to abandon his attempt to take Rome – it was suspected to be arguments amongst his nobles – the Goth King withdrew to the east to winter, this while Flavius set about the task of once more making the city the formidable obstacle it had been on his first campaign. When the next season arrived, Rome had warehouses bulging with food, a strong garrison, solid walls and new gates.
Copies of the keys to the city had been sent to Justinian.
What drew Totila off were the activities of John Vitalianus. The Goth decided he was a thorn he had to excise and he marched south with a large part of his army to effect this. By avoiding the roads and using mountain tracks he avoided John’s scouts and managed to surprise him in his encampment, which he attacked after the sun went down. While that was a success in the sense that the Byzantines fled, it failed, due to the darkness, in his main aim, which was destruction.